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Monday, April 30, 2012

This morning was the reveal for the newest Nuts About Sketches sketch. This is the first time I really struggled with a layout for these sketches, but I think it may have more to do with my fatigue in working with these particular Halloween papers and wanting to make embellishments that fit the theme. Don't get me wrong, there are some really cool patterns in this collection, but I think I just may be ready to move on to something different. Lesson learned, don't buy a whole collection of themed paper...

I used photos of Ellie from Halloween 2010. The papers and embellishments are from several different collections. The pumpkin and crow are stamped images that I heat embossed, fussy cut and adhered with foam adhesive to give them some dimension. The circle around Ellie is a combination of brads and gems.

Sunday, April 29, 2012

My photos this week came from two "field trips" over the last couple of weeks: the fire station and the zoo. Here are my interpretations:

Yellow
These are some ducklings that are part of the zoo's "Farm Babies" exhibit right now.

Something That Makes You Smile
Addy and a friend holding hands. It is so sweet to see little kids sharing this kind of bond.

Ancient or Antique
This one was a little harder than I thought it would be. We don't have any antiques in our house and I guess we don't come across them often. Here is an antique tractor that is a part of the farm exhibit at the zoo.

Splash
Will checking out the penguin exhibit at the zoo.

In The Sun
There wasn't a lot of sun the last couple of weeks, it has been pretty dreary. This is a photo of one of the fire trucks at the fire station. While it isn't outside, it faces a clear door so the sun is reflecting off the shiny metal.

Friday, April 27, 2012

Today is my mom's birthday and I made a card a couple of days ago for her. I used the current card sketch at Sketches: Creatively Yours. I made this card using all small scraps! I adhered the strips directly to the card front after I edged them with gold ink. I dry embossed the whole front of the card(I am really enjoying that technique right now) and then ran my gold ink pad over it to add some highlighting.

I also used the current challenge at Cooking With Cricut which was "Bling, Bling, and More Bling"- right up my alley! As I said above, I used gold ink, two of the papers I used have gold on them, I did some heat embossing, used some Stickles and some gems. I used the Storybook cartridge for the flower.

Thursday, April 26, 2012

I made this welcome baby card for some friends who had a baby a few weeks ago. I used this week's sketch at Mojo Monday. I loved the squares in the background. I used scraps from my May calendar page. After I had adhered the squares I dry embossed the front to make it more cohesive.

I also used this week's Bitten by the Bug 2 challenge which was to use a bumblebee or ladybug cut. I used the ladybug cut from the "Walk In My Garden" cartridge, the scalloped circle cut from the "Storybook" cartridge, and the "Welcome" cut from the "Cindy Loo" cartridge.

I
fussy cut the jar from one of the sheets of patterned paper. I punched
some hearts and then cut the other shapes using the confetti cut from
the "New Arrival" Cricut cartridge.

I
bought the canvas flowers and leaves a while back. For the leaves, I
inked them with an ink pad and sprayed them with water to spread the
ink. Finally, I sprayed them with Iridescent Gold Glimmer Mist. The
flowers I just sprayed with Golden Terracotta Glimmer Mist.

Monday, April 23, 2012

Today is the reveal at Nuts About Sketches for sketch #210. I know I say this every week, but I had a lot of fun with this sketch. Shawn's style of sketches work really well with my style of scrapbooking, I am so glad I discovered them!!
For this layout for Will's baby book, I used photos from his first few months from bath time.
I played a lot with ink on this one. I used my blending tool and Distress Ink to go around the edges of all of my paper. For the bubbles, I cut circles from some thin clear plastic that I had laying around. I used blue alcohol ink, blending solution and a bit of pearl mixative to color the circles. After they had dried, I ran them through my embossing machine with a swirl embossing folder to add some texture.

The light blue block over the top left photo was added before posting for my little boy's privacy. :)

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

For week four of the Scrapbooking Your Faith class we were to make a layout about our doubts or struggles in faith. The class ended a couple of weeks ago, but I wanted to do this assignment and this week I finally got around to it.

For the design of the layout I used the sketch from "My Scraps and More" along with their blog hop challenge which was to use three of the nine items listed on the design team's blogs. The nine items were: scallops, wrapping paper, paper or ribbon strips, banner, a food related photo, bows, cupcake liner, candles, or glitter. I ended up using scallops, ribbon strips and a banner (The torn rectangles across the bottom look like a banner, right?)

I used black matting and inked the edges of elements on the page to add a little pop, but also to suggest the difficulty I have sometimes with my faith. For the title I stamped "When I" on the scalloped circle and cut out "Doubt" using Sure Cuts A Lot and my Cricut.

There are a couple of altered art/ wall hanging assignments that I didn't complete for "Scrapbooking Your Faith" that I haven't decided if I am going to do or not, but I bought Courtney Walsh's book and I already have a few ideas for pages to do. As I wrote the journaling for this layout I felt like I was missing information, so it is a relief to know that I will be doing more on my faith in hopes that I will get more of the "story" out.

Monday, April 16, 2012

We got home late last evening from another family Easter celebration so I am a little late this week posting my photos for the scavenger hunt. Here they are:

Simple
Often it is the simple things in life that make children happy, like rolling down a hill. Here are my daughters and a friend doing just that at the park last week.

Grain
Some dried up seeds on some grass by my in-laws pond.

Transportation
It was raining on the drive home last night and I noticed how cool the lights of oncoming traffic looked when viewed through the rain on the windshield. So I pulled out the camera and started snapping photos (my husband was driving).

Stitch
A cross stitch project I started before I got pregnant with Will. It was put on the back burner for two years while I made his stocking and now I don't feel very motivated to work on it. We'll see when it actually gets finished...

Bubbles
One of the things the kids received yesterday in their Easter baskets were colored bubbles (very fun, but very messy!). Here is Addy blowing some bubbles.

Today sketch #209 was released at Nuts About Sketches. This is a two page sketch, and believe me, I have plenty of pictures to make 2 page layouts out of, but this one didn't work for any of those, so I decided to use the left side and do a 1 page layout. My husband and I are part of a Fantasy Football League and the last several years most of the people in the league have gotten together to have a live draft. These are the photos from that day in 2010.

I took the large photo block and split it up, making space for 2 photos, some patterned paper, and my journaling. I used my Cricut and "Sure Cuts a Lot" to make the title and the "Boys Will Be Boys" cartridge for the football embellishment.

Thursday, April 12, 2012

As part of their blogiversary this week, Unscripted Sketches has posted their third sketch as well as their current sketch. I used that third sketch for this card, a birthday card for my sister-in-law.

I used a Crafter's Workshop mask and some Glimmer Mist for the top part of my card. I used the "Live Simply" Cricut cartridge for the dragonfly.

Sunday, April 8, 2012

Happy Easter everyone!! We were gone today enjoying tome with family, so I am getting this up a little late. I am enjoying getting my camera out and using it again (I am also enjoying being outside and all that natural light does for my photography skills!) Here are my interpretations of the Scavenger Hunt prompts for this week:

New
The plants are really opening up into their spring splendor. Here are some new leaves on one of the maple trees in our yard.

Life
These three are so full of life and what my life is all about. (Yes, I know Ellie's eyes are closed, but by the time I realized it, they were climbing of the rock.)

Fragrant
Some beautiful flowers in an arrangement from some friends last week.

Saturday, April 7, 2012

For my last card of the Lenten season I used this week's Unscripted Sketch. I pulled out my inks and rubber stamps and really went to town on this one. It was a lot of fun! I used Walnut Stain Distress ink around the edges of everything. I also used my paper distresser to rough up the edges. The pine branches and pine cones are from the Stampin Up "Pines" set and the owl is from the Stampin Up "Wildlife Reserve" set.

Friday, April 6, 2012

Happy Good Friday everyone! I hope you all had a blessed and prayerful day. For today's card I used the current Cardabilities sketch and this week's Card Challenge at Club CK which was to use something clear on a card. For my clear item I punched the scalloped circle from a transparency. The background paper and the red and white are actually packaging from some Prima flowers I bought a couple of years ago. I thought the pattern on them was cool, so I kept them and today I finally had the inspiration to use them! I added a couple extra flowers from what the sketch suggests to cover up a couple of holes in the packaging.

Thursday, April 5, 2012

I participated in a round of Chinese Whispers (aka Layout Tag) last month. I always enjoy doing this because I like to pull inspiration from other people's work. My layout is below, if you would like to see the whole string of layouts, you can check them out here (there was a lot of change from the original sketch in this round!).

I've had these photos sitting around for a while because I didn't know how to lay them out on a page, but when I looked at my inspiration layout, it just clicked!I decided to jump on the bandwagon and try out the hexagon trend, especially since many of the game we play have hexagon shaped spaces so it went with the theme! I used the included shapes from "Sure Cuts A Lot" to make the hexagons. I bought a pack of letters on puzzle pieces a few years ago and I think I have used them once, so I decided to use those on the layout. However, they were light pink, so I painted them with dark brown paint to make them work with the colors of the layout (and somehow ended up with brown paint all over my shirt- ack!).

For my card today I used this week's sketch from Sketch Saturday. I also used the color combo from The Play Date Cafe. I have never participated there before because I struggle starting with a color scheme when it comes to layouts (I like to go off of my photos), but it helped give me some direction for my card.

The green patterned paper and the paper in the leftmost panel are some scraps of paper that I bought a few years ago in the Target $1 Spot. The center panel is cardstock that I dry embossed and then rubbed some Weathered Wood Distress ink over it using my blending tool. I used the "Cindy Loo" cartridge for the sentiment (I didn't even realize there were sentiments on this cartridge until this morning when I was flipping through the book!) and the "Botanicals" Lite cartridge for the ferns.

Yesterday (Wednesday) I used this week's Card Pattern. I ended up making two of these because as I was making it, I realized my scraps were pretty much the exact size I needed to make another. When I works out that easily, might as well make two! I used some older papers from a stack for this one. The sentiment is from the "Makin' The Grade" cartridge.

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Yesterday I used this week's Unscripted Sketch to make my card. I wasn't sure what to do with the circle element in the corner, but I thought it kind of looked like a sun so I decided to do something with that. The background paper and letter stickers are Creative Imaginatios and the stamp in Pink Paislee.

On Monday I used this week's Mojo Monday sketch. I have wanted to use this flower cut from the "Cindy Loo" Cricut cartridge for a while now. I love all the layers! I used October Afternoon "Modern Homemaker" papers. For the sentiment and flower I stamped with Versamark and heat embossed using silver powder.